Wed, 10 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Matthew 10:5-15

⁵ These twelve Jesus sent out, instructing them, “Go nowhere among the Gentiles and enter no town of the Samaritans, ⁶ but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. ⁷ And proclaim as you go, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ ⁸ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons. You received without paying; give without pay. ⁹ Acquire no gold nor silver nor copper for your belts, ¹⁰ no bag for your journey, nor two tunics nor sandals nor a staff, for the laborer deserves his food. ¹¹ And whatever town or village you enter, find out who is worthy in it and stay there until you depart. ¹² As you enter the house, greet it. ¹³ And if the house is worthy, let your peace come upon it, but if it is not worthy, let your peace return to you. ¹⁴ And if anyone will not receive you or listen to your words, shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town. ¹⁵ Truly, I say to you, it will be more bearable on the day of judgment for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah than for that town.

Jesus is sending out the twelve apostles to preach the news that The kingdom of heaven is at hand. The Messiah is here. They are given power to perform miracles to demonstrate the truth of what they proclaim, and they are given a specific audience to preach to. At this point, they are to bring the news to the Israelites only.

The people of Israel had the scriptures and were expecting the Messiah, so they should have accepted the message the apostles were preaching. But for the towns that refused to listen, they were commanded to shake off the dust from your feet when you leave that house or town as a testament to them of the coming judgment they will face for having rejected the news of the Messiah. They will face a worse judgment than Sodom and Gomorrah because they had the news of Jesus Christ preached to them, but they refused it. Sodom and Gomorrah never had the gospel presented to them.

What do we learn from this?

Scripture clearly teaches that there are degrees of punishment. All sin is damnable, but there are levels of sin and there will be degrees of punishment.

We all know how bad Sodom and Gomorrah were. But as bad as the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah were, it is a worse sin to reject the news of the gospel. The punishment will be more severe for those who have heard explained what Jesus Christ has done on behalf of sinners and to refuse to turn to God in faith.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Jesus Christ came as the promised Messiah. He did what scriptures foretold as He lived the perfect life and died a substitutionary death on behalf of His people. He has earned, the salvation of all who come to Him in faith.

What a great thing Jesus Christ has done for sinners! And what a great sin it is to reject what He has done by refusing to repent and turn to Him in faith, claiming the grace He freely offers.

Tue, 9 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Genesis 9:1-3

¹ And God blessed Noah and his sons and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth. ² The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea. Into your hand they are delivered. ³ Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. And as I gave you the green plants, I give you everything.”

God’s command to Noah after the flood is the same as His command to Adam: Be fruitful and multiply. Subdue the earth. God is commanding Noah and his offspring to exercise dominion over the world.

What do we learn from this?

Our work is not some secondary thing that we do only to provide the means for our spiritual endeavors. God has commanded that we work. We are made to learn of the functioning of our world and to bring it into submission. In our work, we make this world become useful, for God’s glory, according to His command.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Jesus Christ is King of this world. It is His world, and He has given us dominion to serve as His regents, bringing the world into submission to Him in all ways. When we work at our jobs well, we are obeying this command and we are serving to further the glory of Jesus Christ in the world.

Mon, 8 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Acts 9:1-4

¹ And Saul approved of his execution.

And there arose on that day a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. ² Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. ³ But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.

⁴ Now those who were scattered went about preaching the word.

After Stephen’s death, a great persecution begins in Jerusalem. Christians end up fleeing the city and go throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria. But wherever they go, they bring the gospel with them, and they share the good news about Jesus Christ as they are scattered.

What do we learn from this?

The persecution of the church is a terrible thing. Stephen’s death is so sad. Why would God allow such things to happen?

We don’t always get the answer, but here we are immediately told of the good that God brings about from the evil of the persecution of the church. As a direct result of the persecution, people begin to take the gospel to the world. They move out of Jerusalem and go throughout Judea and Samaria, spreading the news about Jesus Christ.

Where is Christ in this passage?

This is exactly the progression of the gospel Jesus told them about at His ascension.

Acts 1:8 ⁸ But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.

Just as Jesus has told them, they began in Jerusalem, and are now moving to Judea and Samaria. It took persecution to do it, but it is all happening according to God’s plan just as Jesus Christ foretold.

Sun, 7 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Ezra 7:1-10

¹ Now after this, in the reign of Artaxerxes king of Persia, Ezra the son of Seraiah, son of Azariah, son of Hilkiah, ² son of Shallum, son of Zadok, son of Ahitub, ³ son of Amariah, son of Azariah, son of Meraioth, ⁴ son of Zerahiah, son of Uzzi, son of Bukki, ⁵ son of Abishua, son of Phinehas, son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the chief priest– ⁶ this Ezra went up from Babylonia. He was a scribe skilled in the Law of Moses that the LORD the God of Israel had given, and the king granted him all that he asked, for the hand of the LORD his God was on him.

⁷ And there went up also to Jerusalem, in the seventh year of Artaxerxes the king, some of the people of Israel, and some of the priests and Levites, the singers and gatekeepers, and the temple servants. ⁸ And he came to Jerusalem in the fifth month, which was in the seventh year of the king. ⁹ For on the first day of the first month he began to go up from Babylonia, and on the first day of the fifth month he came to Jerusalem, for the good hand of his God was on him. ¹⁰ For Ezra had set his heart to study the Law of the LORD, and to do it and to teach his statutes and rules in Israel.

Ezra now enters the scene, coming to Jerusalem with the desire to teach the law of God to the people now living in the land of Israel.

Ezra is skilled in handling the law of the Lord and he has a great desire to teach the scriptures. He is the perfect person for what is needed as the people are slowly restoring Israel under the rule of the Medes and Persians.

God blesses Ezra and grants him favor in the eyes of the king, so that the king grants Ezra everything he asks.

What do we learn from this?

God provides for the needs of His people. The people needed someone to teach them the law, and so God provides Ezra to return to Jerusalem. Ezra needed provisions for the journey and for restoring temple worship, and the king provides them.

We don’t always understand why all things work out the way they do. What we think in our own minds would be the perfect way rarely is the way things go. But yet we can know with confidence that God will provide for our needs.

Where is Christ in this passage?

One great need we have is for His word. We need to learn it. We need to understand it. God provided Ezra to teach the people His word.

But God has provided one greater than Ezra for us to know His word.

Sat, 6 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Matthew 6:5-6

⁵ “And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. ⁶ But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.”

Jesus here teaches His disciples about prayer.

What do we learn from this?

One of the hard things about prayer is that we are talking to God. By faith we know that He hears us. But we can’t see Him. However, we can see the people around us. So when we pray in public, it is hard to keep in mind that we are praying to God. We can easily fall into the trap of trying to impress the people around us with the eloquence of our prayers. That is what Jesus is warning us about.

Apparently, in Jesus day, there were people who took this to the extreme. They would find the places where they could get the most public attention (street corners and in the synagogues), and then impress their audience with their fine prayers.

Don’t be like that. Don’t pray to impress people. You are speaking to God, not to the people around you. Focus on Him and try to forget the people.

I do not believe this is a prohibition against all public prayer, for we see Jesus Himself praying in public in the gospels. This is an example of Jesus using hyperbole to drive home a point. Like we are to gouge out our eyes or cut off our hands if they cause us to sin, so we are to pray in secret if praying in public causes us to sin.

Beware of this tendency to sin, and realize that even in our best deeds, like praying to God, we still regularly sin against God.

Where is Christ in this passage?

If we are ever to be saved from our sin, God must do it. Our good deeds are sinful and merit God’s judgment. How can we save ourselves?

Thanks be to God, He has saved us by sending the Second Person of the Trinity to win our salvation. He did live a sinless life. All His deeds were without sin. Yet He died on the cross to bear the penalty of the sins of all who come to Him in faith. So the penalty for the sinful prayers of all His people has been paid. And He is in heaven interceding for us, praying acceptable prayers to the Father on our behalf.

Fri, 5 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Genesis 5:1-2

¹ This is the book of the generations of Adam. When God created man, he made him in the likeness of God. ² Male and female he created them, and he blessed them and named them Man when they were created.

God has created everything, and as we saw in Genesis chapter 1, all that He created was declared to be good. But we also saw in chapter 1, and it is reiterated in today’s passage, that God created man in His own image.

What do we learn from this?

We is some way bear the likeness and image of God. That image has been badly marred because of Adam’s fall in chapter 3. We’ve seen the depths of this fall in the last chapter where Cain murders Abel. But still there is some way that we bear God’s image.

God has made us to know Him. He has made us to desire Him. We have a deep spiritual desire for God that can only be satisfied by Him, for we are like Him in a fundamental way. We are created in His image.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Our desire for God can only be satisfied by God. But we can’t come into God’s presence due to our sin. We must deal with the guilt of our sin before we can come to God to be satisfied by Him. We must have the works of righteousness that He requires.

None of us, in and of ourselves, have that righteousness. We all stand guilty before Him, based upon our own deeds. In our own fallen nature, we can never come to God seeking His satisfaction, and find it in Him. All we will find is wrath and righteous judgment.

But, Jesus Christ has borne the guilt of the sins of all who come to Him in faith. He grants His perfect righteousness to all who repent of their sins and trust in Him for salvation. So, all who are in Jesus Christ are accepted by God. They can come to Him seeking the satisfaction they can only find in God because of the work of Jesus Christ on their behalf.

Thu, 4 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Acts 4:1-4

¹ And as they were speaking to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came upon them, ² greatly annoyed because they were teaching the people and proclaiming in Jesus the resurrection from the dead. ³ And they arrested them and put them in custody until the next day, for it was already evening. ⁴ But many of those who had heard the word believed, and the number of the men came to about five thousand.

Peter and John have just been a part of the miraculous healing of the lame man at the temple. They use the opportunity to preach about Jesus Christ, and the priests hear about. They are greatly annoyed about this. What bothers them so? The priests are part of the Sadducees, who, as the liberals of the day, deny there is any resurrection. What bothers them is that the apostles are teaching that Jesus Christ was resurrected from the dead, and that there is a future resurrection that we look forward to.

What do we learn from this?

Opposition to the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead is nothing new. Some people believe that what we have now is all there is. Although there is no hope with their philosophy, they also aren’t burdened by the thought of final and ultimate judgment. This frees them to live however they like, since they deny there is any responsibility for their actions beyond the here and now.

The problem is, truth is not determined by what is convenient for us. We might want to believe something because it gives us freedom to live by our standards, but that doesn’t make it true. And the truth is that there is a resurrection of the dead that will come at the end of time. We will all stand before God in final judgment, and then we will be reunited with our glorified bodies for eternity in heaven, or we will spend eternity in our bodies in hell.

Where is Christ in this passage?

Jesus Christ did rise again from the dead. His tomb is empty. He is the first fruits, and because He rose from the dead, we know that we will also be resurrected.

Wed, 3 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Ezra 3:1-7

¹ When the seventh month came, and the children of Israel were in the towns, the people gathered as one man to Jerusalem. ² Then arose Jeshua the son of Jozadak, with his fellow priests, and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel with his kinsmen, and they built the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings on it, as it is written in the Law of Moses the man of God. ³ They set the altar in its place, for fear was on them because of the peoples of the lands, and they offered burnt offerings on it to the LORD, burnt offerings morning and evening. ⁴ And they kept the Feast of Booths, as it is written, and offered the daily burnt offerings by number according to the rule, as each day required, ⁵ and after that the regular burnt offerings, the offerings at the new moon and at all the appointed feasts of the LORD, and the offerings of everyone who made a freewill offering to the LORD. ⁶ From the first day of the seventh month they began to offer burnt offerings to the LORD. But the foundation of the temple of the LORD was not yet laid. ⁷ So they gave money to the masons and the carpenters, and food, drink, and oil to the Sidonians and the Tyrians to bring cedar trees from Lebanon to the sea, to Joppa, according to the grant that they had from Cyrus king of Persia.

The people have come back from the Babylonian captivity. They returned with a specific commission from king Cyrus:

Ezra 1:2-3

² “Thus says Cyrus king of Persia: The LORD, the God of heaven, has given me all the kingdoms of the earth, and he has charged me to build him a house at Jerusalem, which is in Judah. ³ Whoever is among you of all his people, may his God be with him, and let him go up to Jerusalem, which is in Judah, and rebuild the house of the LORD, the God of Israel–he is the God who is in Jerusalem.”

The people are beginning to do things. They have established an altar, restarted the sacrificial system, and have begun to observe the commanded feasts. They are searching the scriptures to find what God has commanded them to do. But they have not started to do the big work of rebuilding the temple, the thing they ostensibly returned to Jerusalem to do.

What do we learn from this?

It is possible to be doing many small things well in our spiritual lives but to be messing up in the one big way. Sometimes, we are completely blind to these omissions or violations. It might be something we never thought of, but one day we have that head slapping moment when we realize there is this huge, obvious, glaring flaw in our spiritual lives. Sometimes it is something we know about but are suppressing or ignoring. In the back of our minds, we know we need to deal with this problem, but for now we are pretending it doesn’t exist.

We will see in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah that it takes some forceful leaders to clearly see the problems and motivate the people to build the temple and repair the walls of Jerusalem. The people who can see the problem need to point it out to others and encourage everyone to deal with the problem rather than pretend that it does not exist.

Where is Christ in this passage?

We are not saved by our perfect obedience to God’s commands. Thank God for that, since none of us are perfect. We are saved by Jesus Christ’s perfect obedience, and His death on our behalf. But we should desire to be perfect in our obedience to God’s commands. Not because of what we hope to earn by our obedience, but out of gratitude for what God has done for us in Jesus Christ. He has saved us. We should desire to obey Him.

Tue, 2 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Matthew 2:13-15

¹³ Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, “Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him.” ¹⁴ And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt ¹⁵ and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, “Out of Egypt I called my son.”

The Magi have just left from there visit to the baby Jesus. They were warned in a dream not to return to Herod, and so they go back directly to their own land without divulging the location of the one born king of the Jews.

Herod, when he realized that he was tricked by the Magi, does what he can to try to eliminate this threat to his rule: he kills all the male babies two years old and younger in the area of Bethlehem.

But God protects the baby Jesus from Herod’s slaughter by warning Joseph in a dream and sending the young family to Egypt.

What do we learn from this?

God is firmly in control what what happens. As we read through the gospels, we see that God has a plan, and everything comes to pass exactly according to this divine plan. Matthew makes the point over and over again when he points out the history he is relating was all in fulfilment of scripture: This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet…. It was no surprise to God, for He had foretold it long ago.

Where is Christ in this passage?

As we read through the gospels, we are reading the culmination of redemption in history. This is the great act of God saving a people for Himself. Jesus Christ is living the perfect life. He is being challenged and threatened by the religious and political leaders of the day. We see they attempt to kill Him numerous times, but are unable because it was not God’s time. Finally, they succeed in their desire to kill Jesus Christ, but in so doing fulfill God’s ultimate purpose in redemption. They crucify Jesus Christ, who dies in the place of His people, bearing the penalty of their sins upon Himself.

This is God’s plan in the life of Jesus. God is in control of all these events, and Herod is not going to cut God’s plans for redemption short by killing the baby Jesus Christ.

Mon, 1 January, 2007: Today’s Bible readings.

Genesis 1:1

¹ In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

As we come to the new year, let’s start at the very beginning. (A very good place to start.) Genesis 1:1 tells us of the beginning of the world we live in.

What do we learn from this?

God created the universe. He created the heavens and the earth. This is fundamental, and if we don’t comprehend this, we will go wrong on many other things as well. The universe didn’t just one day leap into existence out of a quantum singularity. It did not create itself. The universe was created. We are all creatures, created by God. We owe everything to Him, including our worship and service, for we belong to Him by creation. We belong to Him, for He made us, as well as everything else.

Where is Christ in this passage?

The apostle John makes an allusion to Genesis 1:1 in the beginning of his gospel.

John 1:1-3

¹ In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. ² He was in the beginning with God. ³ All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

The second person of the Trinity, who became flesh in the person of Jesus Christ, was there at the creation of the world. He is the agent of creation, as the Word, used to speak the universe into creation.